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Monday, May 24, 2010

'Possum Treed Him

This is a fun story out of my "Ozark Animal Oddities" File.

The hunting party composed of C. W. Mullan, O. C. Miller, M. J. O'Keefe and Ira Rodamar, with their dogs and traps are home from Missouri where they chased the wild turkey and deer for a couple of weeks in the Ozarks. With them they brought six fine turkeys and quail innumerable.

They are full of interesting, refreshing hunting tales of sporting life in the mountains and are entertaining their friends today. Although they enjoyed a deer drive, they did not succeed in locating any of the animals, and if their experience had been like that of two sportsmen who followed the same trail the next day, it is well that they didn't. Two men standing on either side of a deer which they discovered fired with the result that one was killed instantly.

Mr. O'Keefe never returns from a hunting trip without a memento of some kind. This time it is a real live 'possum which he chased up a persimmon tree and brought back to show his friends. The night of their arrival home the sportsmen were roused from their slumbers on a Great Western train and were hurriedly summoned to the baggage car where they found the baggage man perched upon a trunk with the 'possum eying him ferociously and at the same time watching the excited dogs which were prowling about the car. After the animal was again caged, and the canines subdued, the cause of the trouble was sought but. The ‘possum had clawed off one of the slats of his cage and escaped into the car. One of the dogs woke up and made a lunge for it but the briefness of the chain which held him caused him to swing about and land squarely on the person of the baggage man who was drowsily waiting for the next stop. The man opened his eyes and beheld such a spectacle as would cause anyone to seek a place of safety, which he did and summoned help.

Another interesting thing in connection with the trip is the weaving off of the ends of the dogs' tails.

This was the result of switching them too industriously among the briary underbrush o£ the Ozarks. The dogs down there don't do that way, but these didn't know any better.